Have your cake and drink it (guilt-free)!

An afternoon cup of tea can feel a little lacking without a tasty biscuit or a slice of cake, and the lure of a sugary treat can be almost impossible to ignore if you’re locked down at home with all-too-easy access to the kitchen.

But if you’re trying to be healthier, the growing trend for ‘dessert tea’ could offer a tasty ‘two-in-one’ guilt-free compromise.

Flavoured teas have been around for decades, but the sweet treat craze started two years ago when Yorkshire Tea brought out its ‘biscuit brew’, formulated to taste like tea into which biscuits had been dunked.

‘We’re offering all the happiness of tea and biscuits — just without the biscuit and any of the potential pitfalls that come with it,’ says Kate Halloran, innovation manager at Yorkshire Tea.

Now, tea specialists are pushing the flavour boundaries even further, in a quest to squeeze the essence of Cherry Bakewells, chocolate brownie, apple crumble and carrot cake into a mug.

At just one or two calories a brew, these teas are favourites among diet groups, with slimmers convinced that the indulgent flavourings can trick their brain into thinking they are happily chomping through a packet of Hobnobs or tucking into a second slice of Black Forest gateaux.

Louise Cheadle, co-founder of speciality company Tea Pigs, says her teas ‘can curb sugar cravings, and stand on their own as a sweet treat’.

So I boiled the kettle and settled in for an indulgent session of quaffing in a bid to find out whether a simple cup of tea could really transport me into a reverie of dried fruit and icing sugar, or whether it would set up hideous cravings for the real thing.

In short, can you have your cake and drink it?

DUNKED DIGESTIVES TEA

Yorkshire Tea Malty Biscuit Brew, £2.30 for 40 tea bags, from supermarkets (6p a cup).

Contents: Black tea with 3 per cent natural flavourings

Verdict: Smells like biscuits — although I detect Rich Tea or Nice rather than the digestive flavour they’re aiming for. The strong bitterness of Yorkshire Tea comes through, but the cup leaves a biscuit taste in the mouth just as if you’ve been eating the real thing. Add a half teaspoon of sugar (eight calories) and you could feel you’re enjoying biscuits with your tea.

Calorie saving: 142 (two dunked digestives). 5/5

CREME CARAMEL TREAT

Tea Pigs Rooibos Crème Caramel, £3.99 for 15 bags from teapigs.co.uk (26p a cup).

Contents: Rooibos tea (92 per cent) with caramel pieces.

VERDICT: Has a distinct smell of burnt toffee, but the taste is overwhelmingly redbush (the South African shrub from which the tea is made) — tangy and slightly medicinal.

It was only when I came back to a forgotten half cup which had gone cold that the creme caramel taste came through — possibly because you typically eat creme caramel cold.

Among the flavourings I spotted the additives humectant (which adds moisture), sorbitol (which sweetens) and emulsifiers. It’s a tasty tea, but it comes without a caffeine hit or a particularly strong creme caramel flavour connection.

Calorie saving: 101 (Asda creme caramel). 2/5

TOFFEE BREAK

Whittard Toffee Apple Loose Tea, £6.50 for 100g from Whittard stores and whittard.co.uk (13p a cup).

Contents: Chunks of apple, pineapple and macadamia nuts with rosehip peel and flavouring.

VERDICT: I’d forgotten what a faff loose-leaf tea is if you’re not set up with a strainer, but this is delicious. Even without milk it has a kind of creamy softness — possibly from the macadamia nuts.

It feels indulgent and really did trick my brain into thinking I’d had a treat, at just four calories a cup.

There’s no actual tea in the mix, so I missed the caffeine kick, but it was so tasty I actually scooped out the warm rehydrated fruit and nut mix as a nourishing snack.

Calorie saving: 266 (calorie count for a Tesco toffee apple). 4/5

THE CAKE IN A CUP

Ahmad Strawberry Velvet Cake Dessert Tea, £3.99 for 15 bags, from independent food shops, garden centres and Ocado (27p a cup).

Contents: Black tea, natural flavourings, rose petals which aim to evoke ‘summer strawberries and silky vanilla’.

VERDICT: This is scrumptious and sophisticated. It smells as if it might be packed with sugar and it actually tastes as if it is slightly sweetened. It isn’t.

Drunk without milk it has the rich dark tones of a red velvet cake, but add milk and the flavour seems to transform into strawberry butter icing, providing a fascinating dance of flavours on my palate.

Calorie saving: 480 calories. 5/5

GUILT-FREE BROWNIE

Hoogly Chocolate Brownie Black Tea, £3 for five tea pyramids, from hooglytea.com (60p per cup).

Contents: Combines black tea (66 per cent), with cocoa nibs (34 per cent) and vanilla.

VERDICT: A chocolatey brew which may seem odd in a tea, but this is a sophisticated cocoa hit more reminiscent of 85 per cent artisan chocolate than a Cadbury’s Flake. I appreciate the mild caffeine kick, too.

The flavour isn’t reminiscent enough of a real brownie to offer a realistic substitution, but it’s an effective way to curb chocolate cravings.

Calorie saving: 320 cals (Tesco chocolate brownie slice). 3/5

BAKEWELL BREW

Bird & Blend Cherry Bakewell Tea, £7.25 for a 50g pouch (36p per cup) or £21.75 for a 150g tin, from birdandblendtea.com.

Contents: White tea, almond, cranberries, hibiscus, rosehip, apple, currants, blackcurrant.

VERDICT: Smells divine, with a very subtle almond tang. It’s fresh and fruity-tasting, and if you bring a Cherry Bakewell tart to mind, it is certainly reminiscent of it. But although this is a refined cup of tea, it can’t replace the sugary hit of a Mr Kipling slice.

Calorie saving: 200 (Mr Kipling). 3/5